


Slaves

by tiger_moran



Series: Lyric [19]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes (Downey films), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Anger, Arguing, Crying, Don't copy to another site, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Kissing, Love, M/M, Resolution, Some angst, referenced injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:20:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27524485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiger_moran/pseuds/tiger_moran
Summary: Nineteenth in a collection of standalone but also interconnected Moriarty and Moran fics inspired by lyrics from songs, particularly pop/rock songs.
Relationships: Sebastian Moran/James Moriarty
Series: Lyric [19]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1992709
Comments: 1
Kudos: 8





	Slaves

**Author's Note:**

> Actors – Slaves
> 
> You used to be a slave to your emotions  
> You're so emotional  
> I used to be a slave to your emotions  
> I’m so emotional

The stain forming on the carpet looks ominously like blood; the water drips down the wall, running like tears. The water glass lies shattered beneath the mark on the wallpaper where it struck after Moran threw it, a few feet to the right of the sofa where Moriarty sits. He did not aim it at the Professor - of course he didn't - but even he might have to admit the notion was tempting, for a fleeting fraction of a second.

Moriarty regards the broken, jagged pieces of glass for a moment, glad, in a way, for some reaction at last; to see some kind of real emotion from Moran. First he was too ill to react at all, then when the fever broke and the sickness at last began to pass he was oddly passive, almost too calm for the Professor's liking. He had almost begun to think Moran's brain must have been affected by his raging fever.

Now he has finally done something more and it is violent, explosive even, but at least he has done _something_.

Moriarty told Moran, of what happened after the fall, though he does not remember a great deal of the event itself, or its immediate aftermath. He has explained what happened next, and Moran, lying there in the bed, listened to this mostly in silence.

“The person who found me, who tended to me... he did not have the best intentions, as it turned out,” Moriarty had explained, and Moran had looked at him, a question in his glance, but still not speaking.

“He soon realised who I was, therefore what kind of power and wealth I might possess. A man with aspirations. I could have admired him for that, if he had not tried to keep me rather too helpless and dependent upon him, hoping that he could claim at least a little of my money and power.”

Moran had appeared to think about this for some time, before he spoke again. “He hurt you?”

“Not precisely. He at least got me medical attention, but... still he hoped to exploit the situation, to exploit _me_ , and to keep me in ignorance of a great many things, so that he could take from me what he wanted.”

“Who is he?” Moran asked, looking Moriarty in the eyes.

“It does not matter; he is gone now.”

Moran laughed at this, and this was perhaps the first time in years he had actually sounded a little amused, but there was a note of something close to hysteria in the sound that Moriarty still did not like.

It unnerved the Professor immensely, that Moran showed no real anger still. He had expected fury, rage; deep, profound, bone-deep hurt too, but Moran seemed only to quietly accept everything Moriarty told him. Still he was so remote, so unreachable, choosing still not to open himself up to the Professor.

A week has passed since that talk, and Moran had not raised the matter again, not even once, and every time the Professor seemed about to say something on the subject Moran had shut him down with some inane comment about the weather or the food or some other banality. Moriarty would much prefer tantrums, shouting, raging at him, to that unendurable wall of near-silence Moran has constructed around himself. So yes, it is strangely almost a relief to have him suddenly seize up his water glass and throw it violently at the wall.

“You let me think you dead!” he snarls. “All this time!”

“I know.” Moriarty's voice is quiet. He sits very still upon the sofa, both hands clasped around the head of his walking cane. His greying auburn hair is slicked back neatly; his beard is neatly trimmed, but even though that does almost conceal the scars down his face, he knows still that they are there. He is much more reluctant to look in a mirror these days.

“And that's all you have to say, is it? _I know_.”

“It was not... not my choice. Remember, for a time I did not even know who I was. I certainly did not know where you were then, and with my injuries, my loss of memory...”

“Which came back.”

“Yes.”

“But _you_ didn't, until almost three years had elapsed. I _grieved_ for you. All this because of some stupid bloody feud with that bastard Holmes!”

“I know.”

“What else?” Moran asks.

“What do you mean?”

“What else stopped you from returning to me?”

“That man, he-”

“I know about him, but it wasn't just him, was it? You have been in England for, what, weeks? Months? And yet still you did not come back to me. What stopped you from seeking me out the instant you returned to London?”

“In truth...” Moriarty smiles thinly. “Largely, shame.”

Moran laughs, a sound entirely without any humour. “About what?”

“My own weakness, primarily. That I could be overpowered so easily by that damned Holmes, that my body could be so damaged, that I could allow some little upstart to try to manipulate me, and then...”

Moran stands up, a little stiffly, a little awkwardly, but he walks barefoot over to the Professor anyway and stands before him, above him, and his pale eyes are burning with fury. “Tell me, everything else.” It is an order, a demand, not a mere request.

“My body was weak; my will was weak, and I succumbed.”

“To what?”

“To the allure of the poppy.”

Moran narrows his eyes.

“Laudanum, Moran. Morphine. I suppose I became... in thrall to it.”

“For the pain?” For the Colonel has seen how stiffly the Professor holds himself, and how uneven his gait is, and how he seems to have difficulty at times even bending his fingers. The man's bones have been shattered and though they have healed, likely his body will never be the same again.

“At first, yes, but as time progressed...” Moriarty's lips tighten, and he would love to be able to blame this part on that wretch who found him near the bottom of the waterfall, but alas he cannot blame anyone but himself for this. “ _L'art pour l'art._ ” He laughs, bitterly. “It was more a case of consuming it for its own sake. I had to wean myself off that wretched stuff before I could... come back.”

Moran runs a hand through his own also-greying hair, sighing. “But why?” he asks, and his voice is so much softer already. “I could've... I could've helped you.”

“And pitied me.” For he knows what Moran would be like, fussing around him like some mother hen, being endlessly kind, endlessly compassionate, making Moriarty feel like an infant. Moran is more emotional than him and always has been – to the point when there were times he simply shut himself off, unable to bear it, at risk of being crushed under the weight of his feelings if he did not suppress them somehow. Moriarty does not think that a bad thing, as a rule, Moran being customarily the more emotional one of the two, but he could not endure Moran's pity.

“I wouldn't!”

“You are pitying me right now!” Moriarty snaps, anger flashing across his face, but it is gone a second later.

“So instead of permitting me to pity you, you allowed me to grieve for you instead.”

“I was hardly thinking clearly,” Moriarty points out. “I was injured, unable to remember things with any clarity for a long time.”

Moran looks at him, his arms folded across his chest. “I understand that,” he says. “I do, Professor, but...” _But it was your own fault, what led to this, and_... “You left me.” He drops to his knees, so abruptly that Moriarty looks at him, a little alarmed, concerned that the lingering effects of his recent illness have taken their toll on him.

“Sebastian?”

But Moran only bows his head, presses it against the Professor's thigh. “You left me,” he says again, into the fabric of Moriarty's trousers. “Because you couldn't give it up, your stupid petty feud with Sherlock _fucking_ Holmes! And you allowed me to believe you dead, with not even a body to bury, not a grave, nothing!” His words segue into a choked sound, and then almost silence, but his shoulders are shaking.

“Sebastian.” Moriarty reaches up gingerly with one hand, hesitant, uncertain whether Moran wishes to be touched. “My dove,” he says, which seems to make things even worse. Moran's whole body shakes, racked with sobs so strong they seem to take the breath from him, so he makes almost no sound at all. Moriarty rests his hand against the back of Moran's head, feeling him tremble under the touch. The fabric of his trousers is growing damp beneath Moran's face, but it doesn't matter. “I am sorry,” he says, and Moran looks up at him at last, eyes red-rimmed, tears trickling down his cheeks still. “I am truly sorry. You were right, and I was wrong. I should not have pursued Holmes.” But he could never admit back then that he was wrong, and he was angry with Moran even then, for daring to try to tell him what he should and should not do; how he should deal with Holmes. _Let me put a bullet through his 'ead and 'ave done with it_ , Moran had said, and Moriarty had told him no, let me do this my way. Not all of his words to Moran were kind then, but his foolish pride would not allow him to admit that Moran might be right.

There have been times when he has moderated his behaviour to please Moran, but this time he refused to be some sort of slave to Moran's emotions. He could not and would not steer himself off the course he was on, no matter how self-destructive it was, just to silence Moran's fretting. But he was wrong for that, he knows that now. “I should have listened to you then, and I should have come back to you sooner. I am sorry, chick.” And a tear runs down his cheek, trickling down over the scar there, down into his beard.

Moran stares at him, so astonished by this apology, and by seeing the Professor like this – vulnerable, admitting that he was in the wrong, emotional, even – that his sobs cease almost at once. Something inside him, something that he was trying so hard to keep cold and hard, melts in an instant. “Sir,” he says, and Moriarty may not want pity but Moran cannot help it – cannot help that he cares. He stands up, but instead of straightening up fully he sits besides the Professor and leans forward, so that his face is so close to Moriarty's. “It's all right.”

“It's not all right though, is it?” Moriarty says, as Moran cups his chin very gently. “It's very far from being all right. I nearly got both of us killed.” And that verdict against Moran for Adair's murder, _not guilty_ , it almost counted for nothing, didn't it? Moran still came perilously close to death even when he dodged the noose. He is undernourished, he has been ill, he has been drinking too much, he took up with a young man who was not entirely stable and made threats to expose him, and without Moriarty he simply did not care any more whether he lived or died.

“ _Nearly_.” Moran leans forward and presses his lips against the Professor's, very gently. He is very hesitant, so very tender, afraid of causing the Professor pain, but Moriarty kisses him back then and lifts his hand to brush his thumb along Moran's cheekbone, smoothing away a tear. “But we survived,” Moran says.

“Yes.” Moriarty gives him a bittersweet smile, glad that this is the case, but sorrowful over how much they have both suffered in the past three years. “We survived.”

**Author's Note:**

> L'art pour l'art = art for art's sake


End file.
